


The Kids Aren't Alright

by hanschen



Category: Ed Edd n Eddy
Genre: F/M, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-05
Updated: 2017-04-13
Packaged: 2018-10-14 23:38:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10546300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hanschen/pseuds/hanschen
Summary: The pressures of being Peach Creek's genius drove Double D out of his hometown and away from his friends. Just when he becomes comfortable in a brand new life with an unexpected career and fresh set of friends, Eddy finds him and reinserts him back into Edd's life.  They're missing one critical piece, though, and getting it (him) back may be impossible, unless they can pull off the biggest scam of their lives."May the bridges I have burned light my way back home."





	1. Irresistible

**Author's Note:**

> Originally published on fanfiction.net as "After Hours." If you become emotionally attached to my writing (ugh god forbid), it's about ten chapters ahead over there. 
> 
> This story includes some drug themes and gay themes and etc., etc., etc. If you're really not into it, best run while you can. No Edcest, though, and I will avoid graphic imagery.

_Coming in unannounced, drag my nails on the tile  
_ _I just followed your scent, you can just follow my smile_

_You ought to keep me concealed just like I was a weapon_  
_I didn't come for a fight but I will fight till the end_  
_And this one might be a battle, might not turn out okay_  
_You know you look so Seattle but you feel so LA._

* * *

"I thought your generation was supposed to be dirty and entitled. And I also thought you light techies were supposed to be greasy and lazy."

Edd gap-tooth-grinned but did not look up from his work. Two theatrical lamps sat on either side of him. A small circular pile of wires and lenses lay in front of him. He was clipping the rubber casing off of a braid of wires he gripped in his hands.

"I'm the manager and I'm the unshowered one watching you work."

"I promise this is the last swap I'm doing tonight."

"Boy, if you said you had eight more to do, I'd say 'Too bad, go home.'" The manager peered over his glasses to glance at his smart phone. "It's 7:21. Your shift ended at 7:00."

Edd ignored him. He had stayed overnight in the past, tinkering with the best lamps his meager budget could buy. He didn't worry himself over twenty minutes, nor over the three more minor cuts the copper in the wires were creating in his hands. He'd overwash later.

"I can assume you're not doing the nine PM show tonight?"

Edd shook his head. Other than the veins that seemed to pop a little higher against his pale hands, he showed no emotional response to the question.

"Well, I am, so you have five more minutes, max."

He stumbled and dropped his work. Small bits of copper scattered. "Oh- I'm sorry, I didn't- when is your call- when is everybody-?"

"Most people are coming at eight or eight-fifteen. I was gonna go shower. But I guess it's everyone else's problem, not mine."

"You're heading box office or- oh-" Edd stumbled forward to stop a lens from skidding across the floor.

"Chill out, kiddo… he'll be late. He always is."

"Oh, ha ha, no, certainly, that's fine, I was just nervous, I thought I threw off your schedule, that's all."

"Yeah, sure. Go home. Want me to put that stuff away?"

"No, I have an order I'd like to keep-"

"As usual. Don't know why I ask."

Edd attempted to gather all of his instruments in his skinny arms. Various dust marks appeared all over his black sleeves and black pants.

"Kid. The two of you clocked in plenty of times together under the same roof before you even had issues, so-"

Double D loudly shoved everything in his personal filing cabinet ("his" in that he found the rusted thing in front of a foreclosed studio apartment and taped his business card on the side of it). The clunking shut the manager up so that Edd did not have to disrespect his authority figure verbally. The drawers were labeled: "Rosco Gels." "Apollo Gels." "Misc. Gels." "Extra Wires." His pile went into "Edd - Daily Projects."

"I didn't mean to rush you. Not everyone wants to do overtime for free like you. I'm just not used to kids who give a shit so hard."

"I should learn to keep track of time, though. Punctuality and work ethic should not be mutually exclusive. I am truly sorry."

"And you know you can do personal work whenever. Doesn't matter who's here. You have keys."

Edd grabbed a broom and swept the copper wire bits off the stage. "I know I can get in. That's not why I worry."

The manager took out his e-cigarette and took a long inhale as he watched Edd scramble to erase traces of his work, the end of the vaporizer glowing blue as Double D's speed reached a climax. The puff of vapor that quickly evaporated was roughly the color of the manager's hair. "Hey. Edd. Eddward. Double D. No one's taking sides, okay?"

Just like that, he was done. "Have a great show tonight."

"You gonna relax tonight at home for the first time in your young goddamn life? Gonna watch some TV and smoke some weed like a regular kid?"

Edd cleared his throat as he made his way out the back door. "Relaxing is rather dull."

"One day you'll regret saying that."

* * *

Urban living and a job in theatre had opened Edd's eyes to so many new worries. When he was in high school taking the bus, and someone was staring at him, yes, he had to worry about getting his wallet stolen.  But on the 7:36 U42 bus, who knew? Maybe this pupil-less thirty year old's stares were sexual. _It could be drugs. It could be lust. It could be poverty. Cities are exciting._ He was not even aware if this was the same strung-out thirty year old as last week, or yesterday, or last month, or whenever. That's how good he had gotten at not worrying! A year ago, he'd have a bar graph on junkie twitches increasing over the past quarter.

Not that they had many twitching junkies in Peach Creek to compare it to.  It had only take the nine months since he left for Edd to learn that this was all scary, but that's all it was. That's all junkies and hookers and hobos were. Most of them weren't life-threatening. Did he worry? Sure. But he would always worry, over everything, everyday.  At least in the city, it wasn't over the crushing pressure of academics.  It was simply over if you were going to live to see another commute, and where you were getting takeout from, and Double D took immense comfort in this sense of living in the present.

Even his own apartment – a first month's rent, deposit, and sparse furnishing covered from a grandparent's inheritance money - used to make him nervous, less for the signs of vermin and unsavory floormates (though those were no walk in the park), but because he couldn't stand being alone. Yes, books and basic cable were enough for relaxing over dinner, but what of the sleepless nights? What of the loneliness? He much preferred work.

Or he did before the Jack Incident.

Stress ulcers from thinking about it were imminent. So close he could taste the stomach acid.

_If only the apartment was that close._

To think that work used to be his haven, and now when certain people's names were on the call board for working that night's burlesque shows, he couldn't hightail it out of there fast enough. This couldn't continue. He needed overtime work nights, otherwise, how was he to get any real work done?

Maybe the Manager was onto something. Maybe there would be a new episode of _Hoarders_ or someone appealing on Late Night.

Maybe if he hustled, he could stop by the market on the corner and grab some more rolling papers.

But alas, a stranger with bloodshot eyes was staring at him on the bus and making him nervous. Only his usual amount of nervous, true, but enough to make him want to get home to his apartment fast.

Edd lived on one of those awkward triangular corners where a diagonal road met a major avenue. It was loud, but he had a supply of earplugs (borrowed from the scenery-building shop his theater sometimes did business with) and it had high traffic, but he looks both ways.

It was a chore getting to the third floor of the walk-up. There was an industrial iron-screen door, and there were two deadbolt locks to get through. Though skinny as always, he had some strength by now. _I would not be shocked if it was solely from handling the doors._

On the third floor, he walked through the winding hallway, even his thin frame causing the floor to creak every step. Other apartments on the floor had dirty bikes, skateboards, pieces of haphazard art, or stained mattresses outside them. Edd had learned to ignore these dust-attracting items, though if he had it his way, they would be at least be wiped down with a Clorox wipe or two before abandonment.

Finally, his little hallway, finally apartment 307, finally relaxation- but there was something outside his apartment- _Impossible, I would_ never _leave trash or-_

It was a suitcase. A bumper-stickered, dented wheelie trunk. With a hoodied boy his age on top of it, a head shorter.

"Hey, sockhead! Good to see you're still a- well, you know, a sockhead. Some things never change! You got any chow?"


	2. Jet Pack Blues

_I got those jet pack blues_   
_Just like Judy_   
_The kind that make June feel like September_   
_I'm the last one that you'll ever remember_

_And I'm trying to find my peace of mind_   
_Behind these two white highway lines_   
_When the city goes silent_   
_The ringing in my ears gets violent_

_And I remember "Baby, come home."_

* * *

 

Edd wiped down his beige tiled countertop and kept his eyes glued to the kitchen wall – exposed brick, and not the hip kind. The only visible stains on the tile or the brick would be an obvious result of wear and tear, not a lack of cleanliness, but it wouldn't hurt to clean in front of Eddy to show that he kept a clean home. _Because I do. Keep a clean home. A nice one. Which he wasn't invited into. Which no one is._

"You need to keep an eye on these neighbors of yours, Double D, I'm telling you." Eddy's mouth was full of Chunky Puffs. "If they let me in, who knows who else they'd let in. Good thing you deadbolt that front door. Or I'd have already come in and eaten this whole box. And you know, I'd never peg you for a whole milk kinda guy. More like two percent." Double D had a feeling Eddy was staring at his back, and wondering why he wasn't getting eye contact. "Hey. Double D. Hey."

Double D threw the towel on the empty polished stainless steel dish rack. He turned to face Eddy, who flinched, "What's that look for?"

"Why are you here?" That sounded mean. He _had_ missed Eddy. He didn't turn away the bear hug at the door. "I mean, what brings you to this town? It's not terribly exciting, I'm afraid."

"Yeah, but you're here."

The simplicity of this answer melted a little bit of the ice Double D felt the need to break. "The trip is roughly eight hours by bus. Did you take that, or Amtrak maybe? Or did you-"

"Drive?! Come on. You know my brother would never let me take his convertible over the state line. Not that I haven't tried. I bussed it. Aren't trains like a million dollars?"

"A little safer, though. I just- I wish I knew you were coming. There's nothing- we can go shopping-"

"Yeah, I thought, Double D would probably want to triple clean and plan a party and do the laundry and whatever. But then I thought it would be way more fun to surprise you!"

"Way more fun for whom?" He sat at the table, across from his lifelong friend. "I wish I could entertain but I'm working all weekend. I'll need to set up sheets on the sofa. I don't know if I have extra clean towels. I wish- my life is surprising enough as it is, Eddy."

Edd's first attempt at establishing dominance in the conversation was killed when Eddy broke eye contact to give the apartment a quick scan and a loud snort. "That I can agree with. Considering that grungy-ass brick, man. _Cool_ apartment."

Edd searched his brain for a comeback. Was one necessary? Was Eddy even being sarcastic? Why was it so hard to be the dominant one, still? Wasn't this _his_ apartment?

Eddy interrupted his thoughts. "After all, I did try to warn you, kinda." Eddy pushed the dregs of the cereal toward the middle of the table and stared through Double D, who braced himself for verbal impact. "I emailed you probably five hundred times. Nothin'. And your facebook is deleted. Oh, and you never picked up your phone. Until you got a new number, then the old one just went out of service and you shut off the voicemail box. Your folks won't open the door for me. Not that they wanted to before… now they have an excuse I guess.  They probably think I like... influenced you somehow."

"That's… not true." It turned into a mutter as Double D realized it was.

"I'd put out an ad on the milk carton but no one knew if you still looked like you." He crossed his arms and looked over Double D. "Guess you pretty much do. What's with the all-black get-up?"

"I work at a theater."

"A movie theater?"

"No, a drama... theater... stage."

"A goth theater? A ninja show?"

"This is the stage crew uniform."

"Oh, like high school play club thing you did like twice?"

"… Not exactly."

"You do that for a living now? Whoa. Whodathunkit. I like your apartment. Wanna give me a tour of the space?"

"There's not much to see, I'm afraid. The living room is directly behind you. That little hallway leads to my bedroom, the bathroom, and the storage closet."

Eddy got up and threw himself on the brown faux-suede Ikea sofa. "Whoa, comfy as hell! I can get behind this! Ha, nice coffee table books." He snickered at the copy of _Broadway Musicals of the 1940s_ and absentmindedly began flipping through the copy of _Fun Home_. "Shocked you don't have a whole full bookshelf, smarty pants."

Double D blushed, even though Eddy wasn't one to talk about how much people read. "Bookcases are heavy. And many books are available online or through the local library."

"What library? All you have here are liquor stores, nail salons, delis…" Double D listened to Eddy as he washed Eddy's cereal bowl. "Suspicious massage parlors, sparkly fabric stores… hobos… do you actually like all this?"

"I traveled for the job."

"Traveled, huh? That's it? So does that mean you're coming back?"

 _Oh, alright then. No more small talk. No finesse. Obviously, have we forgotten who we're talking to?_ "I suppose I could visit."

"You should! Everyone totally lost it when you left. It was def the most exciting thing ever in ten years there."

Despite his best efforts to resist, "What did the other kids think?"

"Apparently Sarah started crying in the middle of her math class once, and Jimmy had to get called down from Biology to walk her to the nurse. And she got put into a hospital for three days." Eddy grinned and used air-quotes: "Her parents said it was 'exhaustion' and an 'injury from the softball team.' I guess you'd kinda believe it if they only said one or the other!"

Double D's stomach turned almost as fast as he turned to look at Eddy. "You know how… strong a young woman she is, Eddy. That all sounds like pure gossip, nothing more." The thought of having that effect on anyone made his knees weak but he kept his voice steady. "People should stay out of others' business when not welcome." _But we are talking about Sarah, of course._ "Especially health matters."

"Yeah, well, everyone believes it. Probably because of all the shit she's been through lately." Eddy stared at Double D, hard.

Double D turned to his refrigerator. "I'm afraid there's not much in here. Not much to cook, either, unless you would just prefer eggs." He grabbed a stack of menus clipped to the side of the refrigerator. "Why don't you look through these and find something that interests you? I'll make your bed- well, couch." He walked over to Eddy. "How long did you say you were staying?"

Eddy's hand froze midair to reach the menus. "Four days."

"I'll get some groceries in the morning. You can sleep in. I'm sure you are exhausted from the trip. I'm going into work at eleven in the morning."

Eddy flipped through the menus, organized by cuisine (and alphabetically within each group), pulling out the most expensive-looking pizza place he could find. "What is there to do around here?"

"The company I work for does, um, performances. We have shows… but that's for night. You could take the bus uptown to the mall or Barnes and Noble." Double D returned with a stack of pristine white sheets and a pillow still in its K-Mart wrapper. "I work at a café in the daytime. You're welcome to come and read a book or magazine, or bring a laptop, or- do you have a computer with you?"

"I have a Gameboy."

"Aren't you in school? How do you expect to do homework or keep track of your email?"

"It's community college, Double D. No one does homework."

"With all due respect, that might just be you, Eddy."

"You wouldn't know. You didn't even go to college-"

Double D did not even blink at him. "Touché. Did you decide what you wanted to order?"

"-Even though you got into like, every college on the planet, and yeah can I get a pie with extra anchovies from this place?" Eddy handed him the menu.

"We can go pick it up now."

"Already?"

"This place is a few blocks away. If I order on the way down, it will be ready once we get there." Double D grabbed a jacket and his cell phone. Eddy stared at him. "Would you rather stay here?"

"Yeah, your neighborhood is a little wack at night. I'll make myself comfortable here!"

"It's just a little questionable when it gets very late, it's really just fine in the day time. However…" Double D walked around while he talked, grabbing his keys from a series of hooks on the wall that he installed himself, and checking his wallet. "Eddy, do you remember who let you into the building? That's a little alarming. I don't know many of the other tenants, but maybe… I mean, it's a matter of safety-"

"It was some guy with red hair."

Double D froze.

"I told him I was here to see you and he stared at me for a while and then smiled and let me in. And guess what? Then he left. I don't think he even lives here... Double D? What's up?!"

"Nothing. I just wasn't…" Double D blushed. "I'll go pick up the pizza now. Can you lock this door behind me? Both locks?" He headed out the door. Just after Eddy jumped up to the door, Double D poked his head back in. "Don't open it for anybody."

* * *

 

Eddy was secretly super grateful that Double D bought that he was tired. Valedictorian of Peach Creek High, 5.2 weighted GPA, accepted into eight of the nine colleges he applied to, and he still fell for Eddy's everyday lies. The double-shot latte he picked up from the bus station Starbucks kept Eddy's eyes giddily searching the apartment.

He poked at the magnets on the refrigerator. Even the magnets were so Double D – one for the public library, one for a clinic, one for some kind of electronics supply company. Only one magnet had a job – holding up a list of how to get stains out of clothing. Eddy looked inside the fridge. It was pristine and nearly empty, and even smelled like a Brandsmart USA display fridge. A carton of eggs. Half-pint of whole milk. One takeout container of noodles, labeled **Tofu Pad Thai. DD. Tuesday evening, April 27th** **th** **.** The shelves just had an unopened strawberry jelly jar and… _Eye drops? In the fridge? Allergies. Nerd._ Two unopened bottles (and one opened, two-thirds full) of Garbanzo beans almost sent Eddy out of the fridge right away but a six-pack of Heineken caught his eye. Eddy cracked one open _. He won't mind if I take one, or two later._ He figured a Double D kitchen was still a Double D kitchen, no matter how creepily new, no matter how sudden his departure from Peach Creek and his best friends' lives.

The bathroom was clean, but it wasn't as clean as he was expecting. Under the sink, paper products were meticulously stacked. There was no visible solid dirt, but everything seemed to be stained- a layer of impenetrable grime. But if anyone could do away with it, he thought, it would be Double D. Why hadn't he done it yet? Why hadn't he repainted, bleached, torn out wallpaper and linoleum and dismantled the place in search of mold? It felt so off. Eddy had a sudden urge to give the floor a scrub himself, just to see if it could come off easily. He opened the cabinet again. When no cleaning fluid was visible right away – just a sizeable bottle of KY – Eddy came to his senses and made his way into the bedroom.

This room was the most lived-in, but renovated, obviously the work of Double D. The walls seemed to be painted recently, a classy unmarred navy blue with unscathed molding. No drops of paint on the nubby beige carpet, though it was mostly covered with a couple matching geometric-pattern carpets.

A small flat-screen TV faced the bed. A laptop charged on the nightstand. There was a reading light attached to the headboard. Eddy dove for the nightstand drawer, sliding across the bedspread (wrinkling the navy bedspread, which matched the walls perfectly). There was a bottle of hand sanitizer, a bottle of lavender-scented sheet spray, and _Three full cans of coke? Who keeps that in their nightstand? Double D is such a weirdo._

Uneasily, Eddy wandered over to the closet. Like, not even a neat freak. A weirdo. Look at this closet. ALL BLACK PRETTY MUCH. Who wears this shit? It's not even goth. There's no weird chains or band shirts. It's just regular sockhead nerd shit but black. Eddy crouched to look through a bunch of plastic bins, each of them labeled. Magazines. Taxes. Real estate. Newspapers. Coupons. They were mostly empty. Many spare ones, unlabeled, but one he pushed around a bit wasn't empty. Eddy popped it open. Just a scale. _That's- weird, okay. What's he measuring?_ Two-sided, with digital numeric interface. _Whatever. Who cares what he's measuring. His weirdness, I guess_. Eddy shoved it all back in vaguely the order it was before.

Eddy stomped back into the living room with a magazine he grabbed from Double D's closet, some shiny one titled Out magazine – not that he could tell what that title meant anyway. Did Double D go hiking now?

He skimmed the magazine, but realized it was mostly actual articles and reviews with pictures of people he had never heard of. Eddy tossed it aside and reached for Fun Home again. It was a comic book, at least, and with a faint pang it reminded him of Ed.

Eddy sighed, reminding himself to figure out how to drop that blockhead-related bomb on Double D. _Would it be more dramatic to use it as an excuse when he realizes I'm here too long? Maximize the guilt? Or should I wait until we fight? I'm sure we will at some point. I don't know where his backbone came from but I'd love to see him really try to come for me. It won't work. 'Cause I'll win. Secret weapon and all that._

A small pack of post-it notes fell out of the book. Hey, good idea. I'll make a speech. On these post-its… wait, why are these in here? Eddy flipped through the pages. A post-it was stuck on one page at the end of the book. In pale bluish watercolor, a little girl observed a manly-looking woman in a diner. The post-it covered a few lines: **But like a traveler in a foreign country who runs into someone from home** -

The lock jiggled. Eddy was startled to his feet. The book went tumbling to the floor. The bottom part of the door was unlocked, but there was a chain above it. Someone was trying to break through the chain with force. Eddy was one part too scared to move, one part fascinated to see if they would indeed get in.

The pushing stopped. Eddy heaved a sigh.

Then what looked like a spatula came through the crack in the door jamb. It slid up and flipped the chain.

Eddy squealed and dove behind the couch. The door opened, and in walked a red-haired young man. The one who let him in the building.

"Chill out, weirdo. It's me, remember?" Just as quick as he got in, he turned around, black trench coat fanning out around him, and inspected the chain. "When the fuck did he install this?"

"Hey wait a sec! Don't call me a weirdo, you weirdo! How'd you get in here? This is Double D's place."

"What the fuck kind of nickname is Double D? Why do you and the manager use that? SO weird." He turned to Eddy. It was the first time Eddy noticed the mark below his right eye. He couldn't tell if the black curvy dash was a tattoo or makeup. He didn't know which was weirder. "Hey, what do you know about this new chain? Why would he get a new chain done? Do you have something to do with this?"

"I just got here today... weirdo."

"Then you're the weirdo guest. I have a key at least. And I brought gifts." The Intruder relocked the doors, then plunked a white shopping bag filled with some kind of sweating food on the counter. As he let himself further in, Eddy inched further and further toward the exit, in case of sudden attack.

"I'm not a weirdo guest. I'm his best friend! Who are you? You have a key and you didn't even know all his locks? You're the weirdo. Weirdo stalker is worse than weirdo guest."

Intruder leaned against the counter and crossed his combat boots. "Was he even expecting you?"

"No, but is he even expecting you?"

"Touché. Did he even want you to be here?"

Eddy's face turned as red with anger as the guy's hair. "As much as he wanted you to be here!" Eddy was guessing. But far be it from him to lose an argument.

The guy's posture fell and he tucked his hands in his pockets. "… Touché again."

"But he knows I'm here. So what do you want?"

"Oh, I… uh… left something!" Intruder nearly flew into the bedroom and locked the door behind him.

"HEY! That's not your room!" _Or mine but it's the principle goddammit!_ Eddy hurled himself at the door and began pounding on it. "Don't mess it up!"

The front door unlocked again.

"Oh shit, come on! Dude! Double D's back. He'll lose it, I bet, if-" _Wait, why do I care?_ Just as he stopped pounding, both the bedroom door and front door flew open.


End file.
